For several years the only method of creating PDF files was to pay $200 or more for the software from Adobe. However, in the past year or so, numerous other programs have appeared that allow for creating of PDF files. Most of these new programs are much cheaper than Adobe’s Acrobat program. Last week I wrote about the lowest cost option of all, a free program called PDF995. You can read the two articles I wrote last week: What is PDF and Why Do I Care? and Free Programs to Create PDF Files.

Most of the comments I received told of other low-cost methods of creating PDF files. Several people wrote to describe another free method, although it is limited to only five documents. Adobe has a Web-hosted service that lets you convert a wide variety of documents into Adobe PDF files. You upload your documents in any of a number of supported file formats, including Microsoft Office files, graphics formats, and other file types. You can even submit a Web page’s URL if you want to create a PDF file of a Web page. You can also scan a document, upload the scanned image and have Adobe PDF Online do the optical character recognition (OCR) for you.

Adobe’s Web-hosted service will allow you to create five PDF files at no charge. However, for more than five PDF files, you must pay either $9.99 for one month or $99.99 for one year. Once the fee is paid, you may create unlimited PDF files for that time period. Full details are available at: createpdf.adobe.com.

Anyone using Macintosh’s latest OS X operating system can also create PDF files from any standard Macintosh application. This isn’t exactly free since you must pay for the operating system. Technically, that capability is offered "at no additional cost."

In a similar vein, the latest version of WordPerfect offers the ability to create PDF files at no additional cost. If you own WordPerfect 10, you can use your favorite genealogy program to create output files in a word processing format, then use WordPerfect to convert those files to PDF format.

Last week I mentioned a genealogy program that created PDF files: Family Origins version 10 is a $30 program that will create PDF files for many of its reports. Further information is available at: www.formalsoft.com. A lot of newsletter readers wrote to tell me that Legacy 3.0’s Deluxe Edition has had the same feature for nearly a year-and-a-half. Any report previewed in Legacy 3.0 Deluxe Edition can be converted to a PDF file. Keep in mind that this is true for the $19.95 Deluxe Edition of Legacy, not for the free version. The capability to create PDF files is one of the enticements to upgrade to the Deluxe Edition. You can obtain full details at www.legacyfamilytree.com.

You can find a number of other low-cost shareware programs that create PDF files. You can find quite a few listed at: here

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